[HN Gopher] AMD's Lisa Su
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       AMD's Lisa Su
        
       Author : sohkamyung
       Score  : 298 points
       Date   : 2021-09-24 23:19 UTC (23 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (spectrum.ieee.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (spectrum.ieee.org)
        
       | ChrisMarshallNY wrote:
       | Reminds me of this reporter's gaffe:
       | https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Im6xQyglYuU
        
       | mastrsushi wrote:
       | Mommy Multi-Core
        
       | kolbe wrote:
       | Lisa Su is absolutely amazing. And I love the context of her
       | success. She is kicking ass because she really is the best leader
       | in hardware. That she is a woman is incidental. She doesn't play
       | identity politics or milk her femininity. She just wins and wins
       | and wins by delivering great products at a company that was newly
       | left for dead a decade ago.
       | 
       | I want to see more female CEOs like her, because there are too
       | many like Mary Barra who are there to show the company has a
       | strong female at the helm. And people like her end up doing
       | really poorly and give fuel to sexists. People like Lisa Su just
       | show that women can straight up compete and win.
        
         | tyingq wrote:
         | I don't know much about Mary Barra, but GM seems to be doing
         | well versus their competition:
         | 
         | https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/GM/chart?p=GM#eyJpbnRlcnZhbC...
        
           | kolbe wrote:
           | Mary Barra bought a 10% stake in a company for billions of
           | dollars that was a blatant fraud.
           | 
           | Also weird how your chart didn't include Tesla. You must be
           | genuinely comparing her to her competition and not cherry
           | picking the lowest performers.
        
             | tyingq wrote:
             | Heh. Add it to the chart and it's pretty obvious why I
             | didn't. You can't then read any line other than TSLA.
             | 
             | It's not useful if you're trying to ascertain how someone
             | did trying to revive an old US car company versus how other
             | people did. Nobody was going to make GM go up 12,000%.
             | 
             | https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/GM/chart?p=GM#eyJpbnRlcnZhb
             | C...
        
               | kolbe wrote:
               | GM is currently in need of being revived. It was not back
               | in 2014. Tesla just exploited the whole industry's
               | complacency and incompetence.
        
         | chakkepolja wrote:
         | Yeah look at Mozilla CEO milking the company when it exists
         | instead of improving anything.
         | 
         | It's not that women make bad leaders. It's just that activist
         | types often make bad leaders, because often their activism is a
         | thin veil over their incompetence.
        
           | metabagel wrote:
           | Your first point was about the Mozilla CEO not improving
           | anything. Your next point is about activist CEOs being bad.
           | It's unclear what you mean by activist CEO. Apparently, it's
           | not a CEO who improves anything?
        
       | lvl100 wrote:
       | Bronx Science represent!
        
       | cwizou wrote:
       | As part of my former job I used to follow AMD very closely and I
       | have to say that while maybe misplaced in some ways, she deserves
       | all the praise she gets and then some.
       | 
       | Some context, when she took over, not only was the CPU division
       | in shambles and the product line not that great, but the internal
       | infighting was terrible between the GPU and the CPU division.
       | Most of it was fuelled by the marketing department taking the GPU
       | side.
       | 
       | Not only did she had to handle this, but soon enough she had part
       | of the company actively working against her to get her removed
       | and replaced. I can't tell you how many times some _very_ senior
       | AMD people would go to the press and bad mouth her, talking about
       | her incompetence (and I 'm putting things mildly), and seeding
       | rumors about her near and ineluctable ousting.
       | 
       | Political infighting in a large org is always a thing, but I
       | never noticed anything that publicly overt (at least to the
       | press), prolonged, and acrimonious.
       | 
       | She focused a lot on righting the CPU division and getting the
       | trust of key senior people there and in the end, it paid. During
       | that same period, same people from above were seeding rumors that
       | Ryzen was going to be a bust, and the character attacks went up
       | to 11.
       | 
       | I remember the first Ryzen press event, and you could see a mix
       | of relief and confidence (I would say that prior to that event,
       | she never appeared confident on stage) that came with it during
       | her presentation. At that time she knew that not only she had a
       | good product line for the next few years, but that the coup
       | attempt would die down.
       | 
       | It took some time but those behind the attempts left the company
       | and AMD ended up in a better place.
       | 
       | So yep, her resilience always impressed me and she will never get
       | enough credit for it. AMD's turnaround is obviously not just
       | hers, it's shared with many key people (eg. on Zen, Mike Clark,
       | and Keller who - check for the Anandtech interview in another
       | comment [1] - made the battered and bruised teams believe they
       | actually _could_ ).
       | 
       | But she definitely played a large part in it. A bit before Ryzen
       | was released, I remember casually asking one very senior person
       | on the CPU division what he thought about Lisa. He started
       | talking about the fact that sometimes she sets impossible
       | deadlines (which boss doesn't?), but then he paused and reflected
       | a bit and said "but she listens and understands". Coming from
       | that person, that was about as much praise anyone in management
       | could get.
       | 
       | [1] : https://www.anandtech.com/show/16762/an-anandtech-
       | interview-...
        
       | intricatedetail wrote:
       | There are probably countless workers behind her who made Ryzen
       | possible, but they don't get awards. Probably just above average
       | salary. I don't get this cult of a person in tech. Has this ever
       | ended well?
        
       | einpoklum wrote:
       | While Lisa Su seems like an impressive person, the linked story
       | is basically a PR piece with a very low signal/noise ratio.
        
       | em3rgent0rdr wrote:
       | > Since then, AMD's stock has soared--from less than US $2 per
       | share to more than $110.
       | 
       | Quite a turnaround.
        
         | The_rationalist wrote:
         | I bought at $2
        
         | beebeepka wrote:
         | Still kicking myself for missing out on the 2 dollar bonanza.
         | 50 times growth is no joke. Even some regular folks might've
         | made their first million with Lisa.
         | 
         | Is it too late to buy AMD stock? It hasn't made much progress
         | since last year. ASML, on the other hand, has had a fantastic
         | couple of years. Buying stock nisbrisky. Being indecisive is
         | also risky due to the crazy inflation.
        
           | celim307 wrote:
           | I bought 10k shares @ 2.60, but had to divest for various
           | work related and legal reasons. How do you think I feel?
           | 
           | Also had to sell a similar stake in Microsoft before the
           | turnaround :(
        
             | agumonkey wrote:
             | I found trading vapid and soulless, but there are some very
             | philosophical notions about profit and choice facing
             | uncertainty that are somehow fascinating. I found this to
             | match existential questions in harsh times.
        
               | em3rgent0rdr wrote:
               | What do you expect out of trading? To get a soul-
               | inspiring philosophical revelation? But trading is simply
               | trading...exchanging things you have for things others
               | have that you believe will in net bring more benefit to
               | you. Get your soul-enriching experiences elsewhere, and
               | use the money you get from trading to help find them.
        
               | agumonkey wrote:
               | I find your comment of low value.
        
               | AQuantized wrote:
               | I've enjoyed trading a lot, but find that when I/others
               | become consumed by it alone that it's a bitter existence.
               | By avoid daytrading, and ensuring I'm not invested in
               | anything that I'm forced to constantly worry about or
               | check, it takes a long of the sting out.
        
               | agumonkey wrote:
               | I don't know about you but everytime I sold a near top I
               | felt bad for the people that bought. That's why I found
               | it soulless, a lot of it revolves on the fact that some
               | people are in better position financially and
               | informationally to make gains at the expense of others.
               | 
               | Now maybe I'm too mellow but that's how I felt doing it
               | at first. Maybe I'd rather be a team leader that makes
               | everybody happier working together and sharing.. I can't
               | say.
        
               | AQuantized wrote:
               | It definitely made me appreciate the feeling of creating
               | something along with other people much more. I don't feel
               | 'bad' selling to others, to be honest it's probably a
               | guilty pleasure to 'win', but it lacks the win-win
               | feeling of creating value.
        
               | agumonkey wrote:
               | Probably because I'm in a point of my life where me
               | winning is of no importance. I traded for quick bucks out
               | of emergency but deeply I needed shared human bond and
               | happiness.
        
           | omgwtfbyobbq wrote:
           | Ditto. I remember thinking at $6+ it wasn't as appealing. Did
           | the same thing with Tesla at about $70.
        
           | Macha wrote:
           | I bought some a few months back at $80, it's now at $105, so
           | it's still grown in recent times.
           | 
           | My feeling is it really depends on if they can cement
           | themselves enough to pick up serious datacenter share before
           | someone gets into a technically competitive position (Intel
           | getting their plans back together, an ARM vendor convincing
           | people to make the switch). From what Intel's revealed so
           | far, that feels a couple of years out still.
        
           | lhl wrote:
           | I bought at <2, at 5, at 10, at 20, 30, 50, and most recently
           | (just a few months ago during the last retrace) at 75. AMD
           | has been an execution machine, and honestly, even if/when
           | Intel finally brings back competition, AMD will be fine as
           | long as they keep executing. At this point, there are
           | probably better risk-adjusted places to put your money, but
           | to your point on inflation - 40% of all USD was printed last
           | year, so it seems to me, anyone looking to preserve their
           | savings would be best served looking for some hard assets.
        
             | meltedcapacitor wrote:
             | An AMD share gives you ownership of circa $2 worth of hard
             | assets (net tangible assets), an extra $1 of soft assets
             | (rest of balance sheet: IP, goodwill, etc), and $102 worth
             | of... other things.
             | 
             | How much of that is hopium and how much is fair value of
             | future prospects?
        
           | m0zg wrote:
           | With what's going on in China (Lehman Brothers 2.0 on
           | steroids and cocaine, and printing press that puts US Fed to
           | shame), and massive over-valuation of the stock market in the
           | US now would not be a good time to buy _any_ stocks IMO. This
           | is not financial advice: use your own brain.
        
             | svet_0 wrote:
             | People are saying this every day from the day the stock
             | market opened. The reality is that the market is
             | practically a random walk and to find alpha you mostly need
             | luck.
        
               | m0zg wrote:
               | Right now you're much more likely to _not_ find luck.
               | Look up Evergrande. But hey, it's your money, feel free
               | to give all of it to me, via my short positions.
        
           | bejelentkezni wrote:
           | Time in the market beats timing in the market. It sounds like
           | a meaningless mantra or cop-out, but really, there's no
           | reason to regret missing $2 when there's no time or reason in
           | the foreseeable future where a silicon portfolio won't
           | perform bonkers.
           | 
           | Disclaimer: I own no stock.
        
             | tkojames wrote:
             | This and if you owned just total market index funds you are
             | up over 40 percent from last year. I never try to beat the
             | market just ride it. I am in it for the long term.
        
           | arvinsim wrote:
           | I have been following AMD because of their hardware
           | improvements.l since 1xxx. I was not financially savvy at
           | that time. If I was, I would have bought their stocks
        
           | enchiridion wrote:
           | If you want a moderately more risky play, consider buying
           | XLNX. AMD bought XLNX for an all stock deal at a fixed
           | conversion rate (as in it stays the same regardless of the
           | price of the two sticks) of 1.7.
           | 
           | Currently the ratio is only 1.5 due to uncertainty if the
           | deal will get through regulatory approval, which is a nice
           | arbitrage opportunity if you think it will.
        
             | vasco wrote:
             | Which is a bet. Both can go down together and close the gap
             | on the way. Or the deal may not be approved by regulators
             | or a million other things.
        
       | COGlory wrote:
       | Hire an engineer
        
         | [deleted]
        
       | imranq wrote:
       | She is credited for turning around the entire company from
       | bankruptcy to now eclipsing Intel. Out of admiration and
       | curiosity, how does one go about doing that?
        
         | silisili wrote:
         | I'm not taking away from her, at all. She's kicking ass. But
         | giving the CEO all the credit is unfair to everyone who
         | participated. Keller and Papermaster are equally if not more
         | important in this turnaround. That said, if Su had a hand in
         | having these two on board, then yes she can have most of the
         | credit.
        
           | weiluen wrote:
           | Good to put credit where it's due, but it's good to remember
           | that one of the main levers that a CEO has is identifying
           | talent and team building/org building.
        
           | sprafa wrote:
           | Isn't Keller basically a mercenary/ronin in a good way? He
           | hunts down good projects then executes then leaves. So it's
           | hard to imagine a place where Su or other higher ups were not
           | involved in bringing him in, considering he never stays in
           | one place for too long.
        
           | tester756 wrote:
           | >https://www.anandtech.com/show/16762/an-anandtech-
           | interview-...
           | 
           | There's interesting interview about Keller's role in AMD,
           | especially
           | 
           | >We had this really fun meeting, and it was one of the best
           | experiences of my life. Suzanne called me up and said that
           | people on the Zen team don't believe they can do it. I said,
           | 'great - I'll drive to the airport, I'm in California, and
           | I'll see you there tomorrow morning, eight o'clock. Make sure
           | you have a big room with lots of whiteboards'. It was like 30
           | angry people ready to tell me all the reasons why it wouldn't
           | work. So I just wrote all of the reasons down on a
           | whiteboard, and we spent two days solving them. It was wild
           | because it started with me defending against the gang, but
           | people started to jump in. I was like, whenever possible,
           | when somebody would say 'I know how we fix that', I would
           | give them the pen and they would get up on the board and
           | explain it. It worked out really good. The thing was, the
           | honesty of what they did, was great. Here are all the
           | problems that we don't know how to solve, and so we're
           | putting them on the table. They didn't give you 2 reasons but
           | hold back 10 and say 'you solve those two'. There was none of
           | that kind of bullshit kind of stuff. They were serious people
           | that had real problems, and they'd been through projects
           | where people said they could solve these problems, and they
           | couldn't. So they were probably calling me out, but like I'm
           | just not a bullshitter. I'm not a bullshitter, but I told
           | them how some we can do, some I don't know. But I remember,
           | Mike Clark was there and he said we could solve all these
           | problems. You know I walked out when our thing is pretty
           | good, and people walked out of the room feeling okay, but two
           | days later problems all pop back up. So you know, like how
           | often do you have to go convince somebody? But that's why
           | they got through it. It wasn't just me hectoring them from
           | the sidelines, there were lots of people and lots of parts of
           | the team that really said, they're willing to really put some
           | energy into this, which is great.
           | 
           | >Ian Cutress: Most of the audience questions are focused on
           | your time at AMD, so let's start there. You worked at AMD on
           | Zen, and on the Skybridge platform - AMD is now gaining
           | market share with the Zen product line, and you're off on to
           | bigger and better things. But there has been a lot of
           | confusion as to your exact role at AMD during that project.
           | Some people believe you were integral in nailing down Zen's
           | design, then Zen 2 and Zen 3 high-level microarchitecture.
           | Others believe that you put the people in place, signed off
           | at high level, and then went to focus on the Arm version of
           | Skybridge, K12. Can you give us any clarity as to your role
           | there, how deep you went with Zen versus K12, or your
           | involvement in things like Infinity Fabric?
           | 
           | >Jim Keller: Yeah, it was a complicated project, right? At
           | AMD when I joined, they had Bulldozer and Jaguar, and they
           | both had some charming features but they weren't successful
           | in the market. The roadmaps weren't aggressive, they were
           | falling behind Intel, and so that's not a good thing to do if
           | you're already behind - you better be catching up, not
           | falling behind. So I took the role, and I was president of
           | the CPU team which I think when I joined was 500 people. Then
           | over the next three years the SoC team, the Fabric team, and
           | some IP teams joined my little gang. I think when I left, it
           | was 2400 people I was told. So I was a VP with a staff. I had
           | senior directors reporting to me, and the senior fellows, and
           | my staff was 15 people. So I was hardly writing RTL!
           | 
           | >That said we did a whole bunch of things. I'm a computer
           | architect, I'm not really a manager. I wanted the management
           | role, which was the biggest management role I'd had at the
           | time. Up to that point I'd been the VP of a start-up, but
           | that was 50 people, and we all got along - this was a fairly
           | different play for me. I knew that the technical changes we
           | had to make would involve getting people aligned to it. I
           | didn't want to be the architect on the side arguing with the
           | VP about why somebody could or couldn't do the job, or why
           | this was the right or wrong decision. I spoke to Mark
           | Papermaster, I told him my theory, and he said 'okay, we'll
           | give it a try', and it worked out pretty good.
           | 
           | >With that I had direct authority as it were - but people
           | don't really do what they're told to do, right? They do what
           | they're inspired to do. So you have to lay out a plan, and
           | part of it was finding out who were the right people to do
           | these different things, and sometimes somebody is really
           | good, but people get very invested in what they did last
           | time, or they believe things can't be changed, and I would
           | say my view was things were so bad that almost everything had
           | to change. So I went in with that as a default. Does that
           | make sense? Now, it wasn't that we didn't find a whole bunch
           | of stuff that was good to use. But you had to prove that the
           | old thing was good, as opposed to prove the new thing was
           | good, so we changed that mindset.
           | 
           | >Architecturally, I had a pretty good idea what I wanted to
           | build and why. I found people inside the company, such as
           | Mike Clark, Leslie Barnes, Jay Fleischman, and others. There
           | are quite a few really great people that once we describe
           | what we wanted to do, they were like, 'yeah, we want to do
           | that'. Architecturally, I had some input. There was often
           | decisions and analysis, and people have different opinions,
           | so I was fairly hands-on doing that. But I wasn't doing block
           | diagrams or writing RTL. We had multiple projects going on -
           | there was Zen, there was the Arm cousin of that, the follow-
           | on, and some new SoC methodology. But we did more than just
           | CPU design - we did methodology design, IP refactoring, very
           | large organizational changes. I was hands-on top to bottom
           | with all that stuff, so it makes sense.
           | 
           | >IC: A few people consider you 'The Father of Zen', do you
           | think you'd scribe to that position? Or should that go to
           | somebody else?
           | 
           | >JK: Perhaps one of the uncles. There were a lot of really
           | great people on Zen. There was a methodology team that was
           | worldwide, the SoC team was partly in Austin and partly in
           | India, the floating-point cache was done in Colorado, the
           | core execution front end was in Austin, the Arm front end was
           | in Sunnyvale, and we had good technical leaders. I was in
           | daily communication for a while with Suzanne Plummer and
           | Steve Hale, who kind of built the front end of the Zen core,
           | and the Colorado team. It was really good people. Mike
           | Clark's a great architect, so we had a lot of fun, and
           | success. Success has a lot of authors - failure has one. So
           | that was a success. Then some teams stepped up - we moved
           | Excavator to the Boston team, where they took over finishing
           | the design and the physical stuff, Harry Fair and his guys
           | did a great job on that. So there were some fairly stressful
           | organizational changes that we did, going through that. The
           | team all came together, so I think there was a lot of
           | camaraderie in it. So I won't claim to be the 'father' - I
           | was brought in, you know, as the instigator and the chief
           | nudge, but part architect part transformational leader. That
           | was fun.
        
             | baybal2 wrote:
             | > Arm front end was in Sunnyvale,
             | 
             | So, it's finally confirmed! Zen had an ARM front-end after
             | all.
        
               | cwizou wrote:
               | That's the first confirmation I see of it too, and I
               | followed that pretty closely a while back. We knew they
               | had both at x86-64 and a ARMv8 project running at the
               | same time (K12 was the ARMv8) but it never was really
               | spelled out how they implemented it (best I got back then
               | was that they shared a lot of commonalities).
               | 
               | They cancelled it though as they saw : 1) the ARM server
               | market wasn't happenning, at least not at the timeframe
               | the product was to be ready for 2) the x86-64 could
               | really be competitive with Intel
               | 
               | Then Intel had some issues and here we are.
        
             | silisili wrote:
             | Wow, thanks for this. I'm a huge Keller fan and had never
             | seen this interview.
             | 
             | The guy is so..normal/humble. Looks like someone who you'd
             | get drunk with at some barbecue. Then he talks and just
             | blows you away with how much he knows.
             | 
             | If you haven't already, highly suggest watching his Lex
             | Fridman interview. I learned a lot from it, both about
             | chips and Keller.
             | 
             | https://youtu.be/Nb2tebYAaOA
        
               | tester756 wrote:
               | this one is cool too
               | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oIG9ztQw2Gc
        
             | VortexDream wrote:
             | This makes me think it isn't an accident Keller left Intel
             | after such a short stint with nothing to show for it. I'd
             | imagine the cultural issues run so deep now that even he
             | couldn't turn the ship around.
        
               | silisili wrote:
               | I'd -really- like to know the answer to this.
               | 
               | When he joined Intel, he publicly implied it was where he
               | belonged and his 'last job.'
               | 
               | Not long after, he left, for personal reasons. A lot of
               | people speculated it was health related, for some reason.
               | Then, he just goes elsewhere, making it clear he just
               | didn't like Intel.
               | 
               | Part of me wonders if this had some hand in the CEO
               | getting sacked. If your business is so toxic Keller won't
               | touch it, that's a really bad sign.
        
           | roenxi wrote:
           | Business is the pointy end of civilisation where humanity
           | deals with the real world. If the universe was fair then
           | business could also afford to be fair. But it is not.
           | 
           | Lisa has absolutely got the power to cause catastrophic ruin
           | to AMD through a couple of small decisions and there is
           | nobody who can stop her.
           | 
           | The reality that she didn't do that is just more important
           | than the fact that Papermaster or Keller are technical
           | geniuses and work hard. There are 8 billion people in the
           | world, we are not short on technical geniuses. There are
           | something like 8,000 people out there who are natural born
           | one-in-a-million geniuses at CPU design, Su "just" has to
           | find a few 10s of them for AMD to get insanely good results.
           | There is an eternal shortage of people who are both powerful,
           | good decision makers and capable of recognising a 1:1,000,000
           | genius.
        
             | varjag wrote:
             | There are thousands of well-run large corporations but only
             | precious few master CPU designers.
        
             | cto_of_antifa wrote:
             | The implications of that handwavy first sentence are bad,
             | to be honest. Why is the end-all-be-all of human existence
             | corporate? What essential nature of the universe makes
             | sweatshop labor necessary?
        
             | vmlagw wrote:
             | There is an artificial shortage of good CEOs. Most CEOs get
             | to their position via nepotism of some sort.
             | 
             | If there are 8,000 people who can design excellent CPUs,
             | there are perhaps 1,000,000 people who can recognize such
             | talent.
             | 
             | It is easier to recognize a great painting than to paint
             | it. I'm surprised that HN so often lionizes those who
             | organize the work of others.
        
               | skohan wrote:
               | I moved from engineering to management in the past year,
               | and it is _much_ harder to do well than I understood. You
               | have to deal with a lot of uncertainty, you have to be
               | able to inspire and influence others, and failing to
               | deliver has much more widely reaching consequences.
               | 
               | "Organizing the work of others" is no small task, and
               | people who can _really_ do it well are few and far
               | between.
               | 
               | That's not to take anything away from engineers, but it
               | is to say that good management is something you largely
               | only notice when it's missing, and you need good
               | management to create the environment where good engineers
               | can do their work.
        
               | B1FF_PSUVM wrote:
               | Perhaps the best fictional description I came across is
               | Poul Anderson's The Man Who Counts:
               | https://www.tor.com/2010/11/22/air-war-in-the-stone-age-
               | poul...
               | 
               | It's an SF book, you have a small group trying to survive
               | in an alien world at war. The guy who pulls them through
               | is the canny merchant, who marshalls the skills of others
               | and negotiates their salvation.
               | 
               | I think the narrator in the book was the engineer - and
               | so was the author, Poul Anderson.
        
               | aliswe wrote:
               | publicly traded company CEOs are NOT elected by nepotism,
               | they are elected by the board who tend to be biased
               | towards CEOs who have a track record of increasing the
               | share price...
        
               | WanderPanda wrote:
               | I think the outcome depends more on the decision making
               | when half of your chosen geniuses favour one option and
               | the other half want something else (maybe even the
               | opposite). Same goes for close calls like e.g. 6 vs. 4. I
               | believe that stepping into the (rare) micromanagement
               | questions and making good decisions is what distinguishes
               | the Lisas, Elons and Jeffs from the mediocre managers.
        
         | gumby wrote:
         | It's a great question that is relatively simple to answer (but
         | hard to do).
         | 
         | First, you need good material to work with. This is why it will
         | be hard/impossible to fix WeWork. Sadly it may also make Intel
         | hard/impossible to fix -- lots of great stuff but deeply
         | embedded in a matrix of mediocrity. same for HP (poor choices
         | at the top didn't help) and probably why google can't be fixed
         | -- even more than Intel they have a lot of excellent resources
         | and assets but they are embedded, not in mediocrity, but a
         | fucked up management culture. And they haven't had their near
         | death experience yet.
         | 
         | Second: have enough domain knowledge to be able to identify and
         | nurture the good stuff. One exception to this was Gerstner at
         | IBM (at the time I derided him as "the cookie guy"). He
         | famously visited most of IBM around the world and then his
         | grand plan was: "actually things are great -- let's not make
         | any changes". In reality he shook up the management culture but
         | let most the tech people keep teching. That righted the ship.
         | Sadly he was not followed by successful CEOs, some of whom were
         | otherwise admirable.
         | 
         | Third: be lucky the right way. Sometimes a company won't catch
         | a break (e.g. being a stagecoach maker today) but if there is a
         | trend, or even better a phase change in the market you can take
         | advantage of, take advantage of it. This is the "lucky
         | generals" theory.
         | 
         | Lisa Su is a consummate techie but she uses her brilliance
         | cleverly: she can match what's going on inside the company with
         | external needs, and channel the marketing and sales people to
         | address it in the right way.
         | 
         | Sometimes you can't pull it off. Hector Ruiz was a wizard at
         | Motorola yet somehow he could pull it off at AMD. I couldn't
         | understand why.
         | 
         | OTOH look at someone like Gil Amelio. He only got one thing
         | right at Apple, which was to fire himself and bring back Steve
         | Jobs. But that was an important thing.
        
         | mixmastamyk wrote:
         | You get your company 'firing on all cylinders' while your main
         | competitor falters, a crypto currency boom starts while the
         | government creates trillions of dollars out of thin air.
         | Combination of skill, nerves of steel, and plenty of luck.
        
         | NonEUCitizen wrote:
         | Be an engineer, and do _not_ defer to an MBA (nor other
         | "business types") on business decisions:
         | 
         | https://youtu.be/xxcJzv_sgHg?t=837
        
           | ulfw wrote:
           | Hackernews in a nutshell. MBA useless in everything.
           | Engineers gods in everything.
           | 
           | If only the world was this simple.
        
             | xondono wrote:
             | There's different types of companies that benefit from
             | different approaches.
             | 
             | Engineer leaders tend to have more focus on long term and
             | incremental building. They consider the engineering
             | departments to be the heart of the company.
             | 
             | MBAs tend to focus more energy on sales and marketing, and
             | they generally follow the "internalize profit centers,
             | externalize cost centers" mantra. It's not uncommon for
             | engineering departments to get axed and externalized.
             | 
             | Semiconductor engineering, and specially computing products
             | flourish i. The first scenario and suffer in the second.
        
               | OrvalWintermute wrote:
               | I think what you wrote I found to relate to something I
               | think about often - what is success?
               | 
               | To an MBA, selling off all the IP, selling it off,
               | divesting of key assets and leasing them back, while
               | owning a portion of the relationship at the end is
               | success, treating sales as the most key part of the
               | business process.
               | 
               | To an engineer, in-sourcing, building up strong
               | engineering, R&D, recruiting strong engineering talent,
               | and optimizing product for tradeoffs, treating the output
               | of products itself as the most key part of the business
               | process.
               | 
               | Lisa Su has done just that - if you create the best
               | product based on the best engineering, the buyers will
               | come.
        
               | xondono wrote:
               | > if you create the best product based on the best
               | engineering, the buyers will come.
               | 
               | In some markets, absolutely. In others not so much.
        
           | tester756 wrote:
           | I think blaming MBA/Business/Sales people for everything is
           | not reasonable
           | 
           | Good sales people "want" make your company viable by having
           | money
           | 
           | Tech people "want" to have state of art product
           | 
           | Both are good things at different moments of company lifetime
           | 
           | It sucks to have only engineering people and no people who
           | can do business.
        
             | stjohnswarts wrote:
             | No one wants 0 business people, but they don't want them
             | making engineering decisions in a vacuum like business,
             | accounting, and marketing often do at tech companies that
             | don't emphasize engineering/architecture input.
        
               | skohan wrote:
               | Yeah and it's way more common to have a problem due to
               | business having too much of a voice than engineering.
               | Business tends to be up-stream of engineering, so this
               | leads to a natural power imbalance. A lot of tech
               | companies have issues that could have been solved by
               | treating engineering as a stakeholder instead of a
               | resource.
        
             | specialist wrote:
             | You're right. Save some blame for Wall St and other
             | financial types.
        
             | xondono wrote:
             | The problem is that these two targets have different
             | timelines.
             | 
             | Intel has been dropping the ball in engineering precisely
             | because their teams seem to be focused exclusively on the
             | next quarter/year results.
             | 
             | In a market where it takes 5y to get a product out, you
             | need your people focused in the long term.
        
           | Jensson wrote:
           | Yeah, subject matter experts who learns business seems like
           | the best leaders. That describes most successful founders as
           | well. The hard part is finding those who cares enough about
           | business to get good at it and not just continue being an
           | expert.
        
             | deaddodo wrote:
             | That's overly simplistic. Everyone of AMD's CEOs was an
             | engineer; not an MBA[1]:
             | 
             | * Jerry Sanders | 1969--2002 | Founder, electrical engineer
             | * Hector Ruiz | 2002--2008 | Electrical engineer * Dirk
             | Meyer | 2008--2011 | Computer engineer * Rory Read | 2011--
             | 2014 | Information Systems * Lisa Su | 2014--present |
             | Electrical engineer
             | 
             | And yet only two of them (Jerry and Lisa) are considered
             | _truly_ successful at running the company and one decent at
             | keeping things afloat (Rory). The real answer is much more
             | complex and has to do with Intel's constant monopolistic
             | actions against AMD; some internal struggles (overheating
             | issues early on, bad laptop support, spinning off business
             | divisions right before they were set to be wildly valuable
             | [Adreno, Spansion, etc], wildly overpaying for ATI, etc).
             | 
             | While Jerry and Lisa are both great CEOs for the company,
             | and all credit belongs to them for their leadership; AMD's
             | woes were simply more complex than that.
             | 
             | 1 - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Micro_Devices
        
               | syshum wrote:
               | I dont know much about all of the CEO's of AMD. However
               | the grandparent comment said not to defer to MBA's not
               | that the CEO was an MBA
               | 
               | What i have seen in other companies is that even if the
               | CEO is a subject matter expert, they get to the level of
               | CEO then start deferring business matters to the MBA's
               | who are viewed as subject matter experts of business.
               | This weak leadership and difference to MBA's often leads
               | to extreme short term thinking and lack of vision
               | centered around quarterly probability statements not
               | around core competences or a vision for making the
               | companies product good
        
             | Tabular-Iceberg wrote:
             | That, and avoiding being put down by MBAs who think you're
             | encroaching on their turf.
             | 
             | I'm a big proponent of domain drive design, at least in
             | principle, but I've yet to meet the manager who's going to
             | let developers "waste" the time of the domain experts on
             | "pointless minutiae" instead of just shutting up and
             | writing the damned software.
        
             | wayoutthere wrote:
             | I always say it's easier to teach an engineer business than
             | it is to teach an MBA engineering. Not shit-talking MBAs
             | since I am one, but the degree doesn't confer knowledge;
             | only that you passed a selection filter and probably have
             | an extensive network of other people who passed the filter.
             | 
             | Don't shy away from learning the business. The hardest part
             | of my MBA was accounting -- and you can take an accounting
             | class at community college.
        
           | syshum wrote:
           | I feel the latter to be the bigger impact..
           | 
           | MBA's are plagued by short term thinking around quarterly
           | earnings not building sustainable businesses
        
         | tomnipotent wrote:
         | > eclipsing Intel
         | 
         | AMD had 2020 revenues of $9.76bln to Intel's $77.87bln. This
         | eclipse is going to take awhile. I'm really excited for the
         | results.
        
           | samhwr wrote:
           | >> eclipsing Intel
           | 
           | > AMD had 2020 revenues of $9.76bln to Intel's $77.87bln.
           | 
           | Ever heard of a solar eclipse? ;)
        
           | arp242 wrote:
           | Intel also has a much broader product line; when people talk
           | about "Intel vs. AMD" they're mostly talking about CPUs, and
           | it would be fairer to compare the revenue only from those
           | parts of the Intel and AMD businesses. Right now it seems
           | that Intel has roughly a 60% market share of x86 CPUs vs.
           | ~40% for AMD. I don't now what that is in terms of $ revenue.
           | 
           | Intel was never 8 times bigger; AMD has actually always
           | retained a respectable market share; ~20% market share is
           | nothing to sneer at.
        
             | tomnipotent wrote:
             | AMD also has GPU, embedded, and custom (like Xbox/PS5).
             | Don't get me wrong, I'm an AMD fan since the day I bought
             | my first Athlon and am happy for their success. Good time
             | to be a customer.
        
               | arp242 wrote:
               | Of course, but Intel has more of it, so if you're
               | comparing CPU revenue you should look only at that part
               | of their businesses.
        
         | [deleted]
        
       | blobbers wrote:
       | Is "Lu" her nickname?
       | 
       | 'Looking back, Lu divides her career path into two parts.' bad
       | copy editor?
        
         | stefanfisk wrote:
         | Looks completely normal to me, like using "MacArthur" all over
         | the place in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_MacArthur.
        
           | lancebeet wrote:
           | That doesn't really seem comparable to me, since her surname
           | is Su and not Lu. It would be more like using "DougArthur" in
           | that article.
        
             | stefanfisk wrote:
             | wow, I just didn't see what was wrong until you pointed it
             | out that clearly.
             | 
             | probably sloppy editing, since the articles uses "Su"
             | aaalmost consistently.
        
         | tvphan wrote:
         | A lot of people on Reddit call her Su Bae.
        
       | wbl wrote:
       | How did Lynn Conway not get this award?
        
         | cassonmars wrote:
         | Came here to ask the same thing.
        
       | macktl wrote:
       | Count how many times she has appeared on HN. And make a
       | prediction on how many times she will appear in future.
       | 
       | Corporations are full of well programmed hyper efficient mindless
       | corporate robots who keep the factory lights on. They are all
       | interchangable and no one gives a shit which of them is in
       | charge.
       | 
       | The type of people who smash glass ceilings arent robots. This is
       | another Kamala Harris or Sheryl Sandberg.
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | zz865 wrote:
         | I'm not a Kamala fan but Sandberg is definitely a top exec.
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | kolbe wrote:
         | I don't even know what you're trying to say, but I'm not gonna
         | lie, it doesn't sound very good.
        
           | schmorptron wrote:
           | The comment reads pretty positively to me? As in, "the kind
           | of people who are strong enough to break through glass
           | ceilings are more than just interchangable corporate robots".
        
             | kolbe wrote:
             | But he's implying that the leader of one of the most
             | innovate companies in the past decade is a mindless
             | corporate robot? But Sheryl Sanberg (an ex-McKinsey
             | playbook follower) is more than that? It's such an absurd
             | assertion that I feel I must have misunderstood.
        
               | schmorptron wrote:
               | Huh, no idea what it said since it's flagged now, but it
               | was 4 AM when I originally read it so I must've
               | misinterpreted it. -\\_(tsu)_/-
        
       | noahtallen wrote:
       | I found it absolutely hilarious that this award is sponsored by
       | Intel! Anyways, love where AMD is going. Super curious to see if
       | their next GPUs will finally give Nvidia a run for their money at
       | the high end.
        
         | ur-whale wrote:
         | > see if their next GPUs will finally give Nvidia a run for
         | their money at the high end.
         | 
         | Even if their hardware catches up with and beats that of
         | NVidia, they will still have a huge problem with the software
         | ecosystem.
         | 
         | Everyone who does anything serious with GPGPU and
         | supercomputing is using CUDA, (a proprietary abomination) these
         | days and AMD does not have a competitive product in that space.
         | 
         | That said, the software ecosystem around GPUs is an
         | extraordinary mess, and there is therefore a huge opportunity
         | for the company that can fix it.
         | 
         | Unfortunately, this is a deep cultural problem: as witnessed by
         | the giant mess that is the Nvidia software ecosystem
         | (nightmarish driver version management, proprietary technology,
         | huge unwieldy binary distribution to install anytime you want
         | to run 20 lines of GPGPU code, lack of properly working and
         | debugging and profiling tools, etc...) companies run by EEs
         | (such as Dr. Su) simply don't have the DNA to produce simple,
         | clean, elegant, working software.
         | 
         | The kind of brain it takes to produce cutting edge silicon and
         | the kind of brain it takes to produce cutting edge software are
         | imo simply incompatible.
        
           | imwillofficial wrote:
           | I generally agree. Apple seems to fly in the face of this
           | however. Their silicon story is an interesting one lately
        
             | leucineleprec0n wrote:
             | It flies and stops halfway in the face. Apple's developer
             | tool chains (at least, for iOS and the world of mobile apps
             | and games, Metal notwithstanding) are decent, their
             | codebase is at least a cleaner implementation than what
             | Google have with the combined GPL & refactoring nightmare
             | of the Linux kernel & Android (to be solved by my beloved
             | Fuchsia in time, surely) -- but it's not as if Apple are
             | really a shining light on software overall. To be honest,
             | they absolutely suck. C+ tier stuff. iOS background
             | management, iOS & MacOS UI since iOS 7 & Big Chu--Sur
             | respectively, woefully inadequate security defense on all
             | systems, an AWFUL file manager on MacOS dubbed "Finder",
             | garbage implementation of Bluetooth and WiFi antennae
             | status on control panel, no iOS option for reasonable DPI
             | scaling (zoomed doesn't count), excessive font smoothing
             | only modifiable via Terminal as of MacOS Big Sur --
             | excessive use of advanced animation and sickening
             | transparency leading to poor performance on hardware that
             | makes Android or Windows fly. Oh, no option to delete all
             | messages at any given time via a simple "select all" button
             | in the edit bar for Messages, nor an ability to export all
             | messages to a fricking plaintext file or HTML.
             | 
             | The list continues, and is a long one worthy of a short
             | documentary. Apple excels at a few interface
             | _consistencies_ and at selling premium hardware with high
             | margins in part due to an admittedly deserved proficiency
             | with supply chain consistency  & scale, and with convincing
             | customers to pay with their kidneys for marginal upgrades
             | e.g. 400% up charges on RAM and Storage.
             | 
             | The M1 is impressive, certainly agree, but it won't be too
             | long before others catch-up. Still, let's not get ahead of
             | ourselves about Apple and software prowess. It's been a
             | long time since I preferred Cupertino's code to Redmond's
             | or Mountain View's.
        
               | Zee2 wrote:
               | >to be solved by my beloved Fuchsia in time, surely
               | 
               | As someone on the outskirts of Fuchsia, looking on with
               | longing, desperation, and confusion... do you have some
               | connection to the mysterious pink project?
        
               | setpatchaddress wrote:
               | What's the issue with background task management on iOS?
        
             | ur-whale wrote:
             | > Apple seems to fly in the face of this however
             | 
             | I don't think I agree.
             | 
             | Apple is not really a great software company.
             | 
             |  _Especially_ if you consider how closed their ecosystem
             | generally is: a large part of their stack is basically
             | completely opaque, closed-source and worst of all, prone to
             | change at the whim of the company.
             | 
             | I've always had a hard time understanding why anyone in the
             | business of building technical infrastructure (other than
             | user-facing retail stuff) would ever consider using their
             | products.
        
             | Jensson wrote:
             | Apple bought all high end fab time which means that they
             | can build higher end CPU's than the rest. They can outbid
             | everyone else since they know they can sell those CPU's at
             | high markup in their phones/laptops. Not sure what is
             | interesting about this.
        
           | einpoklum wrote:
           | As a person making a living from being the "GPU guy" - I
           | definitely agree.
           | 
           | The ecosystem around AMD GPUs is quite small - and now that
           | they seem to have abandoned OpenCL (possibly not their own
           | fault though) - even that is put into question.
           | 
           | But things are bad even on the NVIDIA side. Example of how
           | bad: I had to write my own C++ bindings for the CUDA runtime
           | API (https://github.com/eyalroz/cuda-api-wrappers/). You'd
           | think they would have that after 13 years of CUDA being
           | available, right? Wrong. I repeatedly tried to pitch this to
           | them, but they seem to suffer from the "Not Invented Here"
           | syndrome (https://learnosity.com/not-invented-here-syndrome-
           | explained/). This despite me having a lot of respect for
           | people like Mark Harris, Bryce Lelbach, Duane Merrill et
           | alia, and their work.
           | 
           | You're also rights about the "two kinds of brains" - or
           | rather, it's not clear to me that the brains creating the
           | silicon and the brains creating the software are in close
           | enough cooperation.
           | 
           | By the way - it is possible to extract a pretty distribution
           | of CUDA to justify run 20 lines of GPGPU code, from their
           | installer. But they won't be bothered to package this nicely
           | for you.
        
         | WithinReason wrote:
         | >Super curious to see if their next GPUs will finally give
         | Nvidia a run for their money at the high end.
         | 
         | According to leaks their next generation GPUs will be multichip
         | like their CPUs, and Nvidia needs 1 more generation to get
         | there, so they might indeed get a step up on them.
         | 
         | https://youtu.be/E8JCSTPdwHs?t=705
        
       | buescher wrote:
       | Good for her. Good for anyone. AMD has been spectacular. Calling
       | it breaking through any kind of ceiling is almost inappropriate.
       | It's refreshing to see this kind of press in the wake of great
       | things instead of disseminated by her publicist to get her to the
       | next rung somewhere.
        
         | tomnipotent wrote:
         | > is almost inappropriate
         | 
         | I don't think there's any denying that woman have faced decades
         | of discrimination in the workplace, and that the current
         | zeitgeist is that this discrimination was and is particularly
         | bad in technology-related fields.
         | 
         | In that context, it makes her contributions and accomplishments
         | all the more considerable. I don't see how that's insulting to
         | acknowledge, that she likely had more obstacles working against
         | her than her male peers. Pretty well documented obstacles, with
         | no shortage of examples.
        
       | softfalcon wrote:
       | I met her once when I was 9. She's a really nice and friendly
       | person to talk to. Listened to my brother and I talk about
       | Pokemon for a good 15 minutes at least.
       | 
       | Now she's running AMD, kicking ass and taking names. Pretty
       | frigging cool.
        
         | em3rgent0rdr wrote:
         | How long ago was that and where?
        
           | softfalcon wrote:
           | I'm ball parking it cause I was a little kid, but roughly
           | 20-ish years ago? Late 90's to early 2000-something.
           | 
           | At one of the Motorola research plants in Arizona. Back when
           | Motorola still made semiconductor and PowerPC chips.
        
             | weird-eye-issue wrote:
             | You said you met her when you were 9. Assuming you know how
             | old you are now, why do you have to then ballpark the year?
             | Just curious
        
               | sigg3 wrote:
               | Not op, but personally I have to break out the calculator
               | when it comes to my own age.
               | 
               | It's like it's a more viscous entity than an integer.
        
               | cto_of_antifa wrote:
               | Is this a math joke I don't get? How are integers a thick
               | liquid?
        
               | softfalcon wrote:
               | This is funny and true, but honestly, I'm just
               | deliberately obtuse about my personal info. Nothing
               | special, just like my anonymity.
        
               | magicalhippo wrote:
               | Same.
               | 
               | My SO got quite upset a couple of years ago because I
               | didn't know on the spot how old she got on her birthday.
               | My explanation that it's much more efficient to remember
               | the year she was born given that it doesn't change
               | compared to her age fell on deaf ears..
        
               | softfalcon wrote:
               | Yeah, sorry, I like to be deliberately fuzzy about any
               | personal details on the web. That's all.
               | 
               | You're right that I could use exact numbers, but I'm a
               | dumb human who at one point puts an exact number and at
               | another tries to be clever and vague (and fails).
               | 
               | I could do the math, you're right. It was also a long
               | time ago and I could have been 8 or 10. But 9 sounds
               | right.
        
               | weird-eye-issue wrote:
               | Oh I didn't think of that reason, that makes sense! Not
               | sure why I got so downvoted though lol I was just curious
               | 
               | Edit: I see now, you edited your comment and I think that
               | caused a lot of confusion
        
               | softfalcon wrote:
               | ???
               | 
               | I still have "when I was 9" up top. You mean on my reply?
               | You are right, I did say 9.
               | 
               | I just tried to be clear and concise. Sorry if it's
               | causing grief. Was not my intention!
        
               | weird-eye-issue wrote:
               | You're right I got confused... It is getting late here.
        
               | qwertox wrote:
               | No reason why OP should disclose his age.
        
               | rjh29 wrote:
               | OP ballparked the age they met Lisa Su (it may not have
               | been 9). Also no reason to disclose their actual age.
        
               | jhgb wrote:
               | > it may not have been 9
               | 
               | But GGGGP literally said "when I was 9", quite
               | authoritatively
        
               | [deleted]
        
       | iammisc wrote:
       | Lisa Su is awesome, not because she's female, but because
       | literally she's amazing. AMD's transformation is nothing short of
       | spectacular
        
         | neogodless wrote:
         | Her accomplishments can be considered more incredible because
         | of her gender, not because of "gender-specific ability", but
         | because of the (additional) challenges specific to her gender
         | due to culture and industry.
        
         | listless wrote:
         | I find the "amazing, look what a woman did!" narrative to be
         | incredibly insulting.
         | 
         | But congrats to Lisa Su as the person who turned AMD around.
         | They have, IMO, utterly eclipsed Intel. I wouldn't buy anything
         | else.
        
           | azinman2 wrote:
           | You cannot ignore that it's unusual in her field. It isn't
           | easy being an outsider, and to rise up and do exceptionally
           | well in that environment deserves accolades on many fronts.
        
             | listless wrote:
             | I disagree. If a man were to accomplish something against
             | the odds, that would just be a man being a man. Why is it
             | any different when it's a woman? This stuff is patronizing.
        
           | renbrom446 wrote:
           | I'd love to know how much AMD's massive lead is due to AMD's
           | designs and how much it is due to TSMC's 7nm node. Alder Lake
           | on Intel 7 looks like it will largely close the gap, so I
           | think that means AMDs designs are roughly on par with Intel's
           | and the massive eclipsing is due to TSMC. Of course being on
           | par with Intel's IP is still a huge accomplishment.
        
             | lettergram wrote:
             | I would argue AMD's designs aren't so much performance
             | alone, but cheaper to manufacture. Effectively they brought
             | the idea of breaking the chip into components, then putting
             | them together later. That allowed for a cheaper and more
             | robust design.
             | 
             | https://www.techpowerup.com/264271/amd-gives-itself-
             | massive-...
             | 
             | As soon as I saw that back in 2016 I bought a ton of AMD
             | stock. It was clearly a winner because they could have a
             | lower cost design AND potentially better performance.
        
             | jpgvm wrote:
             | Most of their current lead is down to Zen which is
             | architecturally superior to the current Intel Core
             | architecture.
        
             | nirvdrum wrote:
             | Price and feature availability had a lot to do with it. Up
             | until Ryzen came out, a 4 core CPU was the largest core
             | count available in an Intel "consumer" CPU. I had a 6 core
             | Ivy Bridge CPU at one point (i7-4930k) and it cost me
             | ~$550. The motherboard was another $300. Despite the
             | premium, it was still considered a desktop CPU, so ECC was
             | unavailable. And since it was a niche product, I was unable
             | to find a replacement motherboard when I inadvertently
             | damaged mine. Moreover, since the chipsets changed
             | seemingly every new CPU release cycle, I couldn't upgrade
             | either my CPU or my motherboard without replacing both.
             | 
             | AMD released the Ryzen 1700x, with 8 cores, for cheaper
             | than what I paid for my 6 core, and something like half the
             | price of Intel's 8 core offering. AMD made 4 core the
             | baseline, while Intel was still selling 2 core i3s, and
             | they made 6 cores the middle of the road. All of them had
             | hardware threading enabled, whereas Intel had disabled
             | hyper-threading in its i5 line.
             | 
             | AMD also committed to supporting the AM4 socket for
             | multiple release cycles. With BIOS updates, motherboards
             | that launched with with the 1XXX series can run the newest
             | 5XXX series (subject to being able to power them). And the
             | Ryzen motherboards came in two flavors: one that was very
             | affordable (the BX50 series) and one that was more
             | expensive, but had features enthusiasts want (the XY70
             | series).
             | 
             | I don't want to sound like I'm gushing, but AMD came out
             | swinging with Ryzen. I'm probably misremembering, but
             | looking back, I think the only advantage Intel really had
             | at the time was single core performance (and for a niche
             | audience, AVX512). Subsequent Ryzen releases have really
             | closed the performance gap and there the TSMC process
             | improvements help. AMD has garnered a lot of good will at
             | this point. They shook up the stagnant CPU market with both
             | features and price.
        
               | freeAgent wrote:
               | Are you sure X370 boards can run 5xxx Ryzen chips? I
               | believe all of them top out at 3xxx series Ryzen. Still,
               | that's a great run and much better than Intel has done
               | for consumers.
        
               | AlfeG wrote:
               | I.m sure there were news that some companies add 5xxx
               | support to x370 chipset. Not sure how many of them
               | delivered anything.
        
               | wtallis wrote:
               | IIRC, there were no motherboards at that time shipping
               | with a large enough flash ROM to hold the microcode, etc.
               | necessary to support every generation of CPU on the AM4
               | socket, so in practice supporting the Ryzen 5xxx
               | processors would require a motherboard firmware update
               | that removes support from some older processors--possibly
               | the one you're using to prepare for the CPU upgrade. AMD
               | decided that would be a support nightmare and instead
               | opted to make CPU support somewhat loosely tied to
               | chipset generation (beta BIOS versions excepted).
        
               | kllrnohj wrote:
               | > With BIOS updates, motherboards that launched with with
               | the 1XXX series can run the newest 5XXX series (subject
               | to being able to power them).
               | 
               | It's socket compatible but not chipset compatible. X370
               | officially tops out at 3xxx series. Maybe you'll get
               | lucky and find an unofficial bios hack for 5xxx but
               | unlikely.
               | 
               | So to upgrade from a Ryzen 1xxx to a 5xxx in practice
               | means a motherboard upgrade.
        
             | atty wrote:
             | To be fair, as I understand it, feature density of Intel 7
             | nm is more like TSMC 5 nm, from what I have read. Also, I
             | think they took a risk with switching to a chiplet design,
             | and it paid off big for them. Not sure who was in charge of
             | design was when they laid out that roadmap, but whoever it
             | was, and Lisa Su and the upper management, get some kudos
             | for that. Of course, it's quite possible that move could
             | have failed and we'd be laughing at them just like we did
             | for the bulldozer architecture, so maybe they just got
             | lucky :)
             | 
             | But I do agree, all these comparisons we've seen between
             | Intel 14 and TSMC 7 have been... less than helpful for
             | comparing technology. Good for end users making purchasing
             | decisions, of course.
        
               | kolbusa wrote:
               | Off topic here, but it was probably Jim Keller who
               | contributed to Intel doing chiplets. Looked like one of
               | the few sane persons in the leadership when I worked
               | there.
        
               | atty wrote:
               | As an interested outsider (no connections or technical
               | expertise), it seems like Keller's tenure at a company
               | very frequently coincides with very successful products
               | being developed. Is that the view from inside the field
               | as well? Is it seen as a bit of a coincidence, or is he
               | really that good of a technical leader?
        
               | IntelMiner wrote:
               | "we'd be laughing at them just like we did for the
               | bulldozer architecture"
               | 
               | I remember buying the Phenom II X6 1100T day one
               | (December 2010) because we were all waiting for AMD to
               | rise like a phoenix and dethrone Intel's incredible Core
               | series chips
               | 
               | 10 months later (October 2011) Bulldozer finally
               | launched, before crashing and burning on the launch pad
               | almost immediately
               | 
               | It was a hard time being an AMD fan a decade ago :(
        
               | rincebrain wrote:
               | Hey, I too bought an 1100T before Bulldozer launched, and
               | it gave me many years of great service.
               | 
               | Unfortunately, I needed to replace that server before Zen
               | showed up, so the next iteration was (and is) an Intel
               | chip. (Slightly tempted to upgrade it again ~soon, but
               | not impressed by Intel's current "lower-power" Xeon
               | designs, AMD's Epyc Embedded last had an iteration in Zen
               | 1 and according to leaks won't see a new one until
               | 2023(!) and Zen 4, and AArch64 is not bad but I haven't
               | seen anyone selling a server board that was in the right
               | spot between size/power/performance/price yet...)
        
               | MangoCoffee wrote:
               | >feature density of Intel 7 nm is more like TSMC 5 nm
               | 
               | yes but Intel announced 7nm delay while TSMC 5nm is in
               | production and 3nm in risk production. Intel is behind.
        
               | atty wrote:
               | Oh yeah, I didn't mean to suggest Intel is ahead, I was
               | more suggesting that chips built on Intel 7 nm and TSMC 7
               | nm were not really directly comparable on the technology
               | side. Of course for an end user it doesn't really matter
               | what causes the performance, but we were talking more
               | about comparing the architectures.
        
             | mhh__ wrote:
             | We will find out when Alder Lake launches. AMD have earned
             | every penny they have so far, but Intel have new
             | leadership, new designs (Zen took about 5 years to do from
             | start to release, roughly, and 4 years after it's launch I
             | think this is Intel's first proper competitor). Their new
             | top of the line chip (12900k) looks like a bit of a
             | monster.
             | 
             | Should be good for consumers for a while with all this new
             | competition (P.S. Apple, please sell Raspberry Pi some M1s
             | just to scare Intel and AMD)
        
       | golemiprague wrote:
       | Sorry but I am not impressed by women in tech. Even when they do
       | get to prominent roles it is not after creating a company from
       | scratch or working in the technical trenches, it is usually just
       | being corporate types who climb to the top. I don't think it is
       | some glass ceiling, it is just that women don't want to risk
       | anything, don't want to dirty their hands with the actual
       | development of the products and don't have any originality or
       | drive to change things. Women just want to do caring jobs or
       | moving money around, that's why they are doing so well as
       | doctors, lawyers or in marketing. It is a waste of time trying to
       | push them to do things they don't like and don't want to do.
       | Those jobs were open now for years for women and women have made
       | their choice.
        
       | spoonjim wrote:
       | And she did it without being "marketable" which is so often
       | something the market demands of female CEOs.
        
         | ur-whale wrote:
         | Yup.
         | 
         | Surprising: looks like putting someone in charge who actually
         | understands - in depth - how the business and the tech. that
         | powers is actually works instead of random MBA-wielding drones
         | seem to yield good results.
         | 
         | And Intel is also finally learning that lesson with their new
         | CEO.
        
         | tootahe45 wrote:
         | I don't think the market demands it, just the media. Ive
         | noticed the feminist media only focus on pretty white women
         | CEOs, even when they are often disastrous for the company
         | (Yahoo). I've been surprised by the lack of reporting about
         | Lisa's success.
        
       | synergy20 wrote:
       | She failed to revive Freescale before she left for AMD. In fact
       | her strategy at Freescale sped up its failure, but she learned
       | from that missteps and saved AMD.
       | 
       | AMD also got a huge injection of investment from the middle east.
       | Without that money nobody can save it.
       | 
       | She is great, but not that great.
        
         | unnouinceput wrote:
         | "She is great and not alone" - perhaps that's what you wanted
         | to say?
        
       | dis-sys wrote:
       | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Im6xQyglYuU
        
       ___________________________________________________________________
       (page generated 2021-09-25 23:02 UTC)